Protect the bottom line by slashing your power equipment’s service costs

The question then becomes, what areas across your industrial plant can you look for savings to compensate? That’s where GE Venova’s Steam Power Services team can step in and help.

Inflation’s lasting effects

While U.S. inflation has retreated from its 40-year high in 2022, we understand the cumulative price increases of your raw materials remain a business reality…  and that this applies across numerous industries. Across North America, since 2021 we’ve seen price increases including:

• Wood pulp up  ~40%*
• Metals up 30-40%* (depending on type)
• Petroleum up ~4%*
• Chemicals have been impacted as well:
  • Ethylene up- ~50%* (for plastics)
  • Sulfuric acid- year-over-year increase of 10-15%* (the most commonly-used industrial production chemical)

In tandem with other market and geopolitical contributors to your higher production costs, we recognize what you’re up against. So, let’s focus on  one  cost you do have more control over… what it takes to maintain your facility’s power equipment and minimize your production downtime.

Extending your maintenance planning windows

Power demand- particularly in the U.S.- is projected to surge in the next several years, led primarily by the rise of data centers supporting artificial intelligence (AI) technologies. ‘Big tech’ and other companies are already planning new energy infrastructure to meet the incremental power demands AI requires. This trend is impacting many regional power markets in the form of electricity price increases. And while the debate on how much power AI technologies will ultimately require is far from settled, this energy build out will have an inevitable impact on service providers, and the supply chains that support them. 

So, what does this mean for you? Several things:

First and foremost, higher electricity prices make optimizing the availability of your equipment more essential than ever, both to meet your own power needs as well as revenue opportunities from selling excess megawatts you might produce to the power grid.

And secondly, as many service providers support both power utilities and industrial manufacturers, this surge in power demand will likely stretch their resource capacities. To help ensure the reliability- and predictable maintenance costs- of your plant’s equipment, extending your service planning window will help protect your bottom line against potential capacity constraints going forward.

Limiting parts costs

 Our team knows your most common service needs revolve around wear and tear with parts. Our industrial plant service offerings provide options when your parts need attention… whether it’s related to a planned outage or an emergency event. In either case, if your economics suggest a simple replacement is the best choice, our local supply chain can get what you need to your doorstep.

In emergency cases when an unplanned part need emerges, we strive to deliver a customer quote within 24 hours. In other cases, our engineers can scope out a cost-effective repair solution—some of which can be done on site- that saves the time and money of investing in a new part…..as well as limiting your equipment’s downtime.  And perhaps most importantly, our team’s experience enables us to ‘surgically’ pinpoint ONLY the parts you need at any given time to minimize your investment, but still operate safely and reliably.

Seeing around corners to avoid downtime

As you know, one of the biggest impacts to your bottom line can be the unexpected downtime of your turbine generator equipment. An effective way to minimize this risk is through cost-effective testing and inspection activities to spot potential issues well in advance. For example, our TEAMS (Turbine Evaluation, Analysis and Maintenance Scheduling) program- specifically designed for industrial plants- can help you not only avoid forced power outages, but more efficiently schedule your planned events. In fact, many of our customers employing the TEAMS program at their sites have been able to extend their scheduled outage cycles from five to seven years!  And when you do plan your maintenance outages, you can benefit from the insights of parts and/or repairs needs well in advance to better predict- and execute- timely outages with shorter durations.

Optimizing efficiency for varying capacity needs  

As your market demands and/or business strategy evolve, your plant production capacity needs can understandably shift in response. Should you anticipate a pullback in production demand, we can help identify solutions to adapt your power equipment for more efficient operation.

As example, a large pulp and paper mill in the U.S. reached out to our team to derate their industrial steam turbine from 60 to 28 MW. Consequently, they saw a performance improvement of ~6 MW on the same steam supply, and significantly reduced their water treatment costs due to a lowered demand for de-superheating. 

Conversely, if your production needs are ramping up in a sustained way, similar technologies can be applied to help ensure you maintain efficient fuel use and make the most of parts life when you’re operating around the clock. Our  packages include reliability solutions, power uprates and revised flow solutions to improve efficiency. Solutions applying bucket and nozzle design innovations can also increase baseline efficiency, as well as steam path component replacements to offset performance degradation.

So, while no industrial business is immune to the lasting effects of inflation, countering this reality with advanced power service strategies can help set you apart in today’s competitive production landscape.

*Source- Producer Price Index (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics as of February 2025)